The favourite aide-de-camp of the king, Rischofwerder, then very powerful, was to be assailed by irresistible offers, and in case his connivance should be revealed, a splendid establishment in France was to guarantee him against any eventuality.
These instructions fell into the very hands of those whose fidelity was thus priced, and they gave them to the king with all the innocence of individuals shamefully calumniated.

The king blushed for himself at the empire over his politics thus ascribed to love and intrigue.

He was indignant at the fidelity of his subjects being thus assailed: all negotiation was nipped in the bud before the arrival of the negotiator.
M.de Segur was received with coldness and all the irony of contempt.
Frederic Willam affected never to mention him in his circle, and asked aloud before him, of the envoy of the elector of Mayence, news of the Prince de Conde: the envoy replied that this prince was approaching the frontiers of France with his army.

"He is right," said the king, "for he is on the point of entering there." M.de Segur, accustomed, from his long residence and his familiar footing at the court of Catherine, to take love for the intermediary of his affairs, induced, it is said, the countess d'Ashkof and prince Henry of Prussia to join the peace party.
This success was but a snare for his negotiation.

The king, arranging with the emperor, affected for some time to lean towards France, to complain of the exactions of emigration, and to make much of the ambassador; who, thus cajoled, sent the warmest assurances to the French cabinet as to the intentions of Prussia.